FELLINI FOUR FILMS: La Dolce Vita

Q&A with Raymond De Luca, an assistant professor and specialist in international film studies at the University of Kentucky

"The film that conquered the world." —Martin Scorcese

"Truly unforgettable." —Los Angeles Times

"The circus that became the '60s was ushered in cinematically by La Dolce Vita, Federico Fellini's masterwork about the so-called 'sweet life' on Rome's teeming Via Veneto." —Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The biggest hit from the most popular Italian filmmaker of all time, La dolce vita rocketed Federico Fellini to international mainstream success—ironically, by offering a damning critique of the culture of stardom. A look at the darkness beneath the seductive lifestyles of Rome’s rich and glamorous, the film follows a notorious celebrity journalist (a sublimely cool Marcello Mastroianni) during a hectic week spent on the peripheries of the spotlight. This mordant picture was an incisive commentary on the deepening decadence of contemporary Europe, and it provided a prescient glimpse of just how gossip- and fame-obsessed our society would become. —Criterion